Candy Cane Murder (Hannah Swensen #9.5)(7)

“Careful,” Hannah warned, and Michelle stopped walking.

“Let’s just stand here for a minute and look at the stars. It feels like you can reach out and touch them, they’re so huge tonight! They weren’t like this last night when Mother had us over for dinner.”

“That’s because it’s darker out here,” Hannah explained.

“Lake Eden has streetlights on every corner, and there are lights in all the houses. If you combine the lumens from the old-fashioned globe streetlights Dick and Sally put in on this walkway and add the lights they have at the inn, it doesn’t add up to a fraction of the output of a single arc light in the parking lot at Jordan High.”

Both Michelle and Andrea turned to look at her and Hannah immediately realized her mistake. She was offering science textbooks when what they wanted was poetry.

“Of course maybe it’s not true,” she said, trying to ameliorate the damage.

“Maybe what’s not true?” Andrea asked, and Hannah could tell she was still upset about the snowflakes.

“All of it. But let’s take the snow crystals first. That same cloud scientist compared the number of possible snowflake shapes with the number of atoms in the universe. It would be impossible for scientists to examine them all.”

“So he really doesn’t know.” Andrea looked very relieved.

“It’s just a theory, right?”

“That’s right.”

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Joanne Fluke

“How about the stars?” Michelle asked.

Hannah stuffed her gloved hands in her pockets. “They could be bigger tonight,” she said, crossing her fingers. “It’s not an absolute certainty. I like to think the stars and the moon react to us when we watch them. That makes the night magical.”

This drew smiles from both of her sisters and Hannah relaxed a bit. She had to remember to curb her impulse to be realistic and practical when her sisters wanted whimsy and romance.

“Uh-oh!” Michelle stumbled again. “I just stepped on something slippery,” she said.

“What?” Hannah asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Hold on a second.” Hannah drew a tiny flashlight from her pocket. “Norman gave this to me the last time I dropped my keys in the snow.” She switched on the light and trained the beam on the walkway. “You were right here and you slipped on … this!”

“What is it?” Michelle asked.

“A miniature candy cane wrapped in plastic.” Hannah held it up so both of them could see it. “It’s one of Wayne Bergstrom’s and he must have dropped it on his way to the parking lot.”

“You seem pretty happy about finding it,” Michelle commented, reacting to the smile on her older sister’s face.

“I am. I know it’s mean of me, but I’m glad he lost it. I wanted to keep the leftover candy canes to try out a new cookie recipe, but he told me he wanted them all back for his next Santa appearance.”

Andrea just shook her head. “Wayne’s such a tightwad. It’s not like he doesn’t have more. And they probably cost him practically nothing. What were you going to use them for?”

“Chocolate Candy Cane Cookies. And now I can’t make them until I buy some candy canes.”

Both Andrea and Michelle gave little groans of dismay and CANDY CANE MURDER

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Hannah was gratified. “If Wayne dropped one, he probably dropped more, especially if he’s got a hole in his pocket. Let’s keep looking. I don’t think it’s snowed enough to completely cover them.”

“Are you going to use them for the cookies?” Michelle wanted to know.

“No, I’ll buy my own. I just think it would be really funny if we collected them all and gave them back to Wayne at the store tomorrow.”

“Here’s one!” Michelle called out, spotting another cellophanewrapped candy at the side of the pathway. “It looks like he’s dropping one every ten feet or so.”

“This is fun,” Andrea commented, rushing ahead to pick up a candy cane. “It’s like in Hansel and Gretel, except there aren’t any birds or breadcrumbs.”

The walk to the parking lot had turned into a game, each sister trying to find the next candy cane. They had about a dozen when the trail of candy canes abruptly stopped.

“What happened?” Andrea, the current holder of Hannah’s miniature flashlight, spread the light around in a circle.

“We haven’t found anything for over ten yards.”

“How do you know it’s over ten yards?” Michelle asked.

“Believe me, I know how far you have to go for a first down. Bill used to play football, remember?”

Neither Hannah nor Michelle voiced any argument to that. Not only had Bill been the best quarterback in the whole county, Andrea had been the head cheerleader at Jordan High.

“Do you think Wayne ran out of candy canes?” Michelle asked Hannah.

“I don’t think so. The basket was big and it was over half full when Wayne told me to stuff the candy canes in his Santa suit pocket.”

“The hole in his pocket didn’t mend itself,” Andrea pointed out.

“Right. Wayne must have left the walkway for some rea-26

Joanne Fluke